Herald Blogs

With its opulent decor of mirrors and brocade, the intimate 350 seat Spiegeltent is the venue for two of the hottest shows in town, Absinthe and Gazillionaire's Late Nite Lounge, plus an incredible line-up of live music acts from around the world as you've never seen them before.

Absinthe ~ A night time saunter through the strangest, most sultry circus in town. Absinthe collides fair ground attraction with torch song and spectacle within the elegant, sumptuous surrounds of this exceptional venue.

The Williams Institute & Center for American Progress: Unequal Taxes on Equal Benefits: The Taxation of Domestic Partner Benefits

Public policy encourages employers to provide health insurance by exempting that form of compensation from taxation. As a result, married workers who get family health insurance benefits get a double benefit–they get health insurance coverage for their spouses and children and are not taxed on the value of that coverage. In sharp contrast, workers who have an unmarried domestic partner are doubly burdened: Their employers typically do not provide coverage for domestic partners; and even when partners are covered, the partner’s coverage is taxed as income to the employee.

It is with great sadness that NLGJA shares news of the passing of Thomas Morgan III with our members and friends.

According to an article posted by Richard Prince in his online Journal-isms column, Morgan suffered a heart attack while visiting Southampton, Mass. He was 56 years old.

Morgan was a reporter and editor at The New York Times, The Washington Post and The Miami Herald.

A member of the National Association of Black Journalists' (NABJ) national board of directors for 10 years, Morgan was the group's first openly gay president (1989-1991). His tenure laid the foundation for the January 2005 establishment of NABJ's LGBT Task Force.

Morgan was honored by NLGJA in 2005 when he was inducted into the inaugural class of the LGBT Journalists Hall of Fame.

NLGJA would like to express condolences to his partner of more than 20 years, Thomas Ciano, as well as his other family members, friends and colleagues.

While funeral arrangements have not yet been made, Ciano has said that contributions made in Morgan's name would be welcome at the Gay Men's Health Crisis.

You can read much more about the life of this inspiring and pioneering journalist at:

(Tallahassee, Florida) Florida Attorney General Bill McCollum's Office has implemented a policy that allows his employees to use sick leave to care for their domestic partners.

"With this pro-family policy, Attorney General McCollum has become the second constitutional officer in Florida history to recognize the needs of non-traditional families," said Rand Hoch, President of the Palm Beach County Human Rights Council.

The Palm Beach County Human Rights Council is a non-profit organization that has been in the forefront of domestic partnership issues in Florida for more than 15 years.

At the Council's request, Florida CFO Alex Sink instituted a policy permitting her office's employees to use sick leave to care for domestic partners.

On October 17, shortly after Sink's policy went into effect, Hoch wrote to Attorney General McCollum asking him to consider implementing a similar policy.

"By doing so, in times of family emergencies, all of your employees will have the same opportunities to care for their family members," Hoch wrote.

By letter dated December 17, Cathy Christensen, McCollum's Human Resources Administrator, notified the Hoch that the Attorney General's sick leave policy would would not specifically address domestic partners per se, it would "provide enough latitude" for employees to use their sick leave to care for their domestic partners.

"Since the Office of the Attorney General is, in effect, the state's law firm, I can understand his reluctance to formally recognize domestic partnerships," said Hoch.

"Still, the effect of both pro-family policies is the same," said Hoch. "Employees working for two of our state's constitutional officers now may use sick leave to care for their domestic partners in times of emergency,

Currently, the University of Florida, Florida International University, Broward Community College, Florida Keys Community College, Hillsborough Community College and Miami-Dade College are the only state employers offering the full range of domestic partner benefits. Those benefits include health insurance, as well as sick leave and bereavement leave.

The Palm Beach County Human Rights Council has not yet heard from Agriculture and Consumer Services Commissioner Charles Bronson, who also was asked to revise his office's policy.

Early next year, the Palm Beach County Human Rights Council intends to ask Governor Crist to direct Department of Management Services Secretary Linda South to investigate the possibility of offering domestic partner benefits to all state employees.

Well-known Registered Investment Advisor David Treece is now bringing his expertise and knowledge to bear answering questions from readers of ENV Magazine (www.envmagazine.com). Treece was offered and accepted the opportunity to present a Question and Answer format financial advice column in the “Ask the Experts” section of ENV Magazine’s popular web site. The column could also appear in recurring editions of the beautiful, full-color glossy monthly print edition of ENV.

“Ask the Experts” is presented by ENV Magazine and local editor/consultant Michael W. Sasser. Additional columns have been assigned for the section with others still in development.

“This is a great opportunity to reach people with real information they can use,” Treece said. “There is so much misinformation and incomplete information out there, it’s terrific to be able to help people.”

Helping people is nothing new for Treece, founder of Treece Financial Group, Inc. Treece routinely presents informational seminars and believes the column is an extension of his effort to provide people with useful unbiased information.

Treece is also part of a national group of financial planners who call themselves the “Ralph Naders” of financial services – consumer advocates with a legal obligation and fiduciary duty to always put a client’s interests first. The group’s motto, “Doing the things other advisors forget to do”™ is even trademarked.

Treece has almost 15 years experience in the financial services industry, has founded several civic organizations and chambers of commerce, and Treece Financial is a member of the Better Business Bureau.

Treece’s column can currently be found by accessing the ENV Magazine web site and clicking on the “Ask the Experts” tab.

For more information on David Treece, call (305) 751-8855 or visit www.davidtreece.com. For more information on “Ask the Experts,” call Michael Sasser at (786) 351-5169 or email SassFL@aol.com. For more information on ENV Magazine, call (305) 770-4501.

KATMANDU, Nepal (AP) — Nepal's top court ruled Friday that the government must create new laws to protect gay rights and change current ones that might be tantamount to discrimination, an official said.

The Supreme Court issued the order in this conservative Himalayan kingdom after hearing a petition filed by four gay activist groups seeking greater rights for homosexuals, said court spokesman Til Prasad Shrestha.

Shrestha indicated it is up to the government to determine how the ruling should be implemented. It was not immediately clear whether the ruling overturns current laws banning homosexuality or whether the government would be compelled to recognize same-sex marriages.

Homosexual acts are punishable in Hindu-majority Nepal by up to two years in prison.

A government representative could not immediately be contacted.

Sunil Pant of the Blue Diamond Society, the country's main gay rights group, said it was a bold decision by the highest court in Nepal, where homosexuals frequently face harassment, including by police.

"It was an extremely positive decision and a pleasant surprise for us. It would set a precedent for other conservative countries like Nepal," Pant told The Associated Press.

For his entire childhood, Kourt Osborn felt as if he were playing a character in a play. But when the play was over, he kept his costume on and continued pretending to be someone he was not: a girl.

Now a college student two years after initiating transgender treatment and living as a man, he has found that Southern Utah University housing officials cannot accommodate him because he lacks medical documentation that "proves" he is male.

Citing criteria that Osborn's supporters denounce as arbitrary and an invasion of medical privacy, university officials insist on proof that transgender students have undergone various medical interventions, including surgery, or that they have been diagnosed with "gender identity disorder."

"SUU administrators could have taken this opportunity to reach out and better understand the issues transgender students face as they seek access to public education," said Valerie Larabee of the the Utah Pride Center. "Their invasive requirements for Kourt to be granted access to housing are yet another example of the need for nondiscrimination policies which include sexual orientation, gender identity and gender expression."

But Neuman Duncan, SUU's housing director, said the school is not discriminating against transgender students. Instead, it is simply following a policy to ensure the comfort and safety of all students.

"He has not transgendered completely so we are unable to assign him men's housing," Duncan said. SUU's housing policy requires that transgender students provide a letter from a doctor that says they have undergone all necessary treatments and hormone therapy has been complete. "Where they're in the process [of gender transition] I have no place to put them," he said.

"That they would require someone to have surgery to live in the dorm is just wrong. It's absolutely irrelevant. They don't ask anyone else for proof of gender. They shouldn't be checking his genitals," said Mara Keisling, executive director for the National Center for Transgender Equality. "Universities shouldn't be making medical decision for students."

Osborn has filed a formal grievance with SUU. Because of publicity about his case, a Cedar City resident has offered him an apartment, but he still hopes SUU revises its housing policies and apologizes.

"I never was a woman. I was a boy trapped in this foreign girl's body," said Osborn, now 22. "Transgendering allowed me to take off the costume and make-up and allowed me to be who I am."

Osborn grew up in Kanab, where he now lives with his family and is awaiting a return to Cedar City next month to resume school as a sociology major.

After his freshman year at SUU, where he lived in the women's dormitory, he went to Philadelphia in 2005 to undergo hormone therapy and live in a transgender community. He plans eventually to go to the University of Utah, where he expects to be accommodated.

Regarding surgery, which has been the sticking point with SUU officials, Osborn decided it was unnecessary.

"It's really expensive and really invasive," he said. "It's quite often not functional. A lot of things can go wrong."

Advocates dismiss the notion that surgery is necessary to complete gender transition.

"No surgery is going to remove the discomfort other people have," said Will Carlson, Equality Utah's policy director. "It's important for people to face these stigma."

Keisling believes gender has nothing to do with genitals.

"Kourt isn't a man because he says he is a man. He just is and they should respect it because it is. It isn't about surgery," Keisling says. "Colleges are supposed to be safe places to learn and that means all the students have to be safe."

Next month, debut author Evan Fallenberg will be in Miami to promote the release of his novel, LIGHT FELL (Soho Press; January 2008; $22.00). He will be signing at Books & Books in Bal Harbour on January 10th at 7:30 pm. – the first time all six will be together in nearly two decades.

LIGHT FELL

Publishers Weekly called LIGHT FELL "an ambitious debut" that "adroitly sketches the heartfult struggles of a sympathetic cast, and Kirkus deemed it "a sensitive first novel." Booklist noted that it "resonates on many levels, and Library Journal found LIGHT FELL "compelling." Binnie Kirshenbaum wrote that "Evan Fallanberg has written an honest and brave book," and Aryeh Lev Stollman called LIGHT FELL "exquisite, marvelously peopled and extraordinarily moving."

Evan is a native of Cleveland, Ohio, but has lived in Israel since 1985, where he is a writer, teacher, and translator. He, like his main character, was once married with children, but left his wife after almost nineteen years to move in with another man - one whom he had been in love with for over a decade.

tells the story of a married man in a small religious community in Israel who falls in love with a rabbi and leaves his wife and sons to pursue this new life. Now, twenty years have passed, and though the affair is long over, its effects continue reverberate through all of the Lichts’ lives. As his fiftieth birthday approaches, Joseph prepares to have his five sons to Sabbath dinner in his Tel-Aviv penthouse